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Understanding the causes of cancer is half the battle in defeating it, and Maine is leading the fight.
The Maine Institute for Human Genetics and Health (MIHGH) recently finished a genetics research lab offering cutting-edge facilities and equipment. The laboratory, located on Sylvan Road in Bangor, features a tissue bank, research labs, access to state-of-the-art equipment and opportunities for collaboration with the University of Maine and nearby high schools.
Dr. Roger Phipps, department head of bone genomics and overseer of the institute’s educational outreach program, said that involving the surrounding community is a “major mission” of the institute.
“We are going to involve high school and college students with summer programs and internships,” he said. “It gives students a great opportunity to get a taste of biomedical research.”
All the research at the institute has a cancer focus and takes advantage of unique population and data dynamics available in Maine.
“Maine has a lot of unique attributes,” Phipps said. “It is in the Northeast, and it has a stable population, so genetically it is very easy to trace traits … the pollutants in Maine are very discreet and there is a lot of information on where they are. Some of them are man-made from mills and the leather industry, but also granite has high levels of radon, which – secondary to tobacco smoke – is the second-leading cause of lung cancer, and the water has high levels of arsenic.”
The institute hopes the relative homogeneity of the population compared with the pollutant data available will allow for the geographic mapping and study of the environmental factors that cause cancer. That information can be cross-referenced with cancer samples collected from across the state for future research.
“People have done bits and pieces of it before,” Phipps said. “Some people have the environmental data, and tissue repositories are a dime a dozen, but nobody has put them all together. If it all works out, it’s going to be pretty powerful.”
Another project that uses the data available at the institute is one headed by Marie Hayes, UMaine professor of psychology and lead coordinator of the Neurogenetics Consortium at MIHGH. A Defense Department grant funds her research and focuses on the psychological hardships endured by the families of cancer patients.
“The research is done on state of Maine pediatric cancer, which is very rare. … It examines the psychological consequences of cancer on family, developmental needs and anxiety. We are trying to find out which children under which conditions are affected by this,” Hayes said.
The Defense Department seeks to use the research to determine the types of people most affected by Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.
Hayes’ work is one of the research opportunities the institute yields and one of the ways university students can be involved with research.
“The advantages of the partnership are that we bring scientists from UM who work on translational and clinical research in neurogenetics and biomedical sciences,” Hayes said. “It is an astounding opportunity to be in the most cutting edge area of biomedical research with the clinical and translational data that allows [students] to develop skills in broad research fields.”
The institute is still in its infancy with 16 full-time employees. When all positions are filled, there will be 35 full-time employees and 100 jobs created in the community.
“The institute will be able to bring in money for the economy,” Phipps said, “and then there are lots of novel ideas that will be created to generate even more money into the hospital system as they collaborate with pharmacies.”
MIHGH hopes to have a large impact on not only the field of cancer research, but the economy of Maine and the future of students as well.
Bangor Daily News